A fruitful life

Mark and Catriona White lived in a lot of places before coming back to their roots in the Eastern Bay of Plenty. Catriona comes from Opotiki, and Mark hails from nearby Waimana; they met as teenagers at Opotiki College.

While Mark was working as operations manager for NZ Post in Auckland, and Catriona was a busy mum with two young children, the couple began to think what their next move would be. They had lived in Christchurch, Timaru, Dunedin, Napier, Wellington, New Plymouth and Hamilton, but were looking for more stability and a great place for the children to grow up in.

A simple wishlist

“We sat down and wrote a list of what we wanted in our life,” said Catriona. “It was a pretty simple list: our own business, to live coastal, somewhere in the North Island, and we wanted the kids to be able to bike